Floral Hi

This is my third card for the "Artist Call" challenge that Ellen Hutson is conducting. The call is to find guest artists for their Pin-sights challenge series. My background technique was inspired by this card that Catherine Pooler made.

I stamped two of the flowers & leaves from "Bold Blooms," from the Essentials by Ellen line, in Versamark ink onto an A2 size panel of Strathmore Smooth Bristol paper. After stamping each image, I heat embossed it with Ranger Silver Pearl embossing powder, then masked it & stamped the next image, until I had an arrangement I liked. I then watercolored them with Distress inks in Barn Door & Fired Brick for the flowers, and Mowed Lawn for the leaves.

For the background, I taped my "Blocks" stencil from Dylusions over my panel. I used foam ink blending tools to apply Spun Sugar & Worn Lipstick Distress inks, going from the upper right towards the lower left. When I got near the flowers, I switched to a fingertip sponge dauber, and applied Barn Door Distress ink to finish the ombre, making sure to avoid the images. Finally, I went over the whole background with Spun Sugar, just to knock the white background down a bit.

I die cut my greeting using one of the "Happy Hellos" dies from My Favorite Things from dark green cardstock, having backed it with Stick It adhesive before cutting. I also die cut with the same die from my background. I adhered my background to a white A2 card base, and adhered my "hi" die cut into the negative space. And that finished this card!